by Travis Mateer

On the day before Thanksgiving my appearance on Sam Tripoli’s Tin Foil Hat went live and I couldn’t be happier.

This is just one way I’m hitting back the narrative controllers of Zoom Town.

While I discuss issues like meth, homelessness and missing persons, a thin-skinned developer by the name of Aaron Wagner was busy pounding margaritas and shit-talking Missoula locals who don’t approve of his BIG CONDO plans.

Here’s an excerpt from the newspaper that is both reporting on this asshole AND facilitating his development project by being the property that sold to his development group:

Wagner responded to scores of commenters angrily. In one response, he wrote, “Land abduction (with crying tears emojis). I paid $10mm for the land….More than your life and soul is worth…so here’s a little tip…f— off and get a life (with a middle finger emoji).”

First, I’m curious about Wagner’s expertise on the value of souls. Does he know about the asking price of souls because he sold his? Here’s more from this POS:

In yet another response, he wrote, “Look you little pre pubescent dunk, you don’t know s— about economics or taxes or how to solve homelessness or a housing crisis. So leave that to the professionals like me, stop whining and go back to your parents basement and eat your cheetohs and play Fortnite. Us grownups have to actually fix real problems.

Well, Aaron, let me introduce myself: my name is Travis Mateer and this town has been my home for 21 years. 10 of those years I spent working at a homeless shelter and an aging services organization where I became intimately aware of how our Mayor and his cronies have been “solving” the problems you referenced.

Other things you should know about me: I haven’t lived in my parents basement since high school, I don’t eat cheetohs, and I despise video games. Oh, and my hobbies include taking my dog for a walk, building facsimile worlds out of Legos, and exposing how money rolls in this town.

Here are some things Missoula locals should know about Aaron Wagner: he likes drinking margaritas while on vacation, insulating his kids from the rage locals experience while they get gentrified out of existence, and rationalizing his drunken antics by referencing the position he played on the gridiron, linebacker.

Wagner said he is on vacation with his family and had “a few too may margaritas” before he posted some responses.

…

Wagner said he’s sorry his actions have caused a “backlash” that Bergquist will feel as well.

He noted that Bergquist played quarterback, which requires a certain level of calm.

“I’m a middle linebacker, which sometimes is a bull in a china shop and gets a little out of control,” he said. “But that’s not the best way to engage people.”

See? It’s a football thing. Or, more specifically, a LINEBACKER thing. I guess they take their pigskin ethos into the business world where winning is everything. I think I’m starting to see how this football player mentality fueled problems in our humble little mountain college town, like that rape scandal Jon Krakauer wrote about.

I’m glad former football players get a chance to make some quality loot in Missoula on the development of a property that once produced physical copies of this narrative controlling technology that reluctantly reports on the violence committed by current players.

And, since the narrative is so tightly controlled in this town, I’ll be looking for MORE opportunities to tell my story to audiences OUTSIDE this elitist bubble, where our neoliberal rubber-stampers give increasingly hollow lip-service to economically squeezed locals while providing ACTUAL services to wealth in order to reshape this town to their liking.

Fuck that.